Article: 7710 of alt.hackers
From: chowes@trance.helix.net (Charles Howes)
Newsgroups: alt.hackers
Subject: Re: also WANTED: VMS info
Date: 21 Apr 1995 04:49:18 -0700
Organization: Helix Internet
Lines: 47
Approved: just this guy, you know?
Message-ID: 3n863u$nop@trance.helix.net
NNTP-Posting-Host: 204.244.2.2
Status: RO

In article <UNI.EDU-1404951107260001@amana.math-cs.uni.edu>,
UNI.EDU <UNI.EDU> wrote:
>
>In another fun twist of fate, I find my campus sysop capturing my
>sessions to disk.  Not only does he have a copy of EVERY keystroke
>I make, but also everything on my screen.  This is not only a
>profound violation of my privacy, making it impossible to exchange
>private email, it also makes any passwords I type insecure, and
>to top it all off, the file is IN MY DIRECTORY, and is quickly eating
>up all my quota of blocks.  I've got about 63 free right now, and need
>a solution.
>
>The file is appended when I log off.  I cannot *see* the file, but my
>quota goes down in proportion to the amount of keystrokes and text viewed
>my previous login.  Any ideas how to show this file in the directory,
>or how to delete it if I find it?  It's on a Dec Alpha running OpenVMS.
>
>Please respond with a followup instead of a reply, for obvious reasons.

Sigh.

If only it were a unix system, you could:

  1) remove the file
  2) replace it with a file you can read
  3) replace it with a symlink to /dev/null

Is there a VMS tool for showing a list of all open files?

If you fill up your quota with a big empty file, does the keystroke
logging program crash and burn?

If so, can you still use the system afterwards?

Maybe try uploading files; the file transfer looks like keystrokes; a
63-block file transfer should do it.  Let the file be random garbage.

Also, doesn't VMS have the principle "If a file affects your quota, you
have control over it"?

Oh, and just in case it is a unix system, check for a filename
starting with a ".".  'ls -la | more' comes to mind.
-- 
--
Charles Howes -- chowes@helix.net
 Always tell the truth, then you make it the other bloke's problem! 
 - Sean Connery, 1971   

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